


A Smiling Sea

by emungere



Series: Ladders [9]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Knives, M/M, Scarification
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-05
Updated: 2015-02-05
Packaged: 2018-03-10 16:31:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3297095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emungere/pseuds/emungere
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hannibal puts his mark on Will again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Smiling Sea

**Author's Note:**

> thanks very much to fitofpique for the beta! <3 
> 
> Title from [Elegiac Stanzas by Wordsworth](http://www.bartleby.com/145/ww277.html).

Hannibal sat out on the patio, book open in his lap as he watched moths swoop toward the lights and away, briefly illuminated lives vanishing into darkness. He was aware of Will standing behind him in the doorway, watching him or watching the insects or both. 

"Are you going to join me?" Hannibal asked. 

Will approached. He was barefoot from the sound of his feet on the stone. He smelled faintly of shampoo and the lemon soap Hannibal had bought in town. His hair dripped on the back of Hannibal’s neck when Will bent over him. He laid a hand on Hannibal’s shoulder but said nothing. Underneath the clean scent of soap and damp, Hannibal could detect a thread of fear. 

He tipped his head back to look up at him. "What is it?" 

"The sextant," Will said. "If you’re going to do it— It should be soon. It'll need time to heal before I leave."

"I could wait until your return."

"I don’t want to wait."

"You don’t want me to do it either."

"No, but I want it _done_." WIll shifted and bent over further to rest his cheek against Hannibal’s. "It’s going to hurt." 

"You’ve enjoyed a certain amount of pain in the past."

"There is a really big difference between your nails on my back and your _knife_." 

"Shall we do it tonight?"

"Tonight?" Will sounded alarmed, but he was nodding already. "Yeah. Good. Let’s get it over with." 

"If you truly don’t want to, I wouldn’t wish—"

"Oh, come on. Don’t try to be noble. It doesn’t suit you."

Hannibal said nothing. 

"Sorry," Will said, after a second. "I’m— I’m kind of terrified actually. But I do want it, and I know you’re going to enjoy it, so just— Let’s just do it."

"You can wait for me in the bedroom. You’d better put some towels down." 

"Thanks." Will pressed a kiss against his jaw and walked quickly away. 

Hannibal closed his eyes for a moment and still saw the dark flashes of insect bodies cutting across the light. Human life in miniature, hurtling from dark to dark. Such a brief span brought with it the obligation of enjoyment. He rose and went to sterilize his scalpel. 

*

Will had lit candles in the bedroom. Hannibal smiled at the soft glow, at the man laid out naked on the bed, skin rose gold from the sun and bathed in warmth. His wet hair shone. One hand picked nervously at the corner of a pillow. 

"How much are you going to enjoy this?" Will said. 

"Oh, a great deal." 

"Could you—"

"What?"

"Never mind. Just do it."

Hannibal changed into loose pajama bottoms. Already red, they wouldn’t stain too badly if there was some mess. He sat astride Will’s hips. 

"Shall I warm the knife?" he asked. "Lord Nelson complained only of the chilled metal when the surgeon sawed off his arm." 

Will swallowed audibly. "For God’s sake, Hannibal." 

"You weren’t so fearful the first time." 

"I didn’t know what you were going to do or what it would feel like. I’ve had a long time to think about this." 

Hannibal cleaned his back with alcohol and pondered his next remark. Half of him wanted to reassure Will, to make this easy for him, to remind him that he was safe and it was only pain, and short lived pain at that. A much older part of him was too aware that this particular chance would never come again. He could cut Will open and see him raw in more ways than one. 

"How long have you meant to speak to me about this?"

"At least two months. I kept putting it off. It’ll be hard to work on the house while it heals."

"Yes. You must be careful not to overstretch the skin." Hannibal picked up the scalpel and looked at his canvas. "I tied you to the table last time."

"I know," Will said tightly. 

"It excited me, knowing that you couldn’t get away." 

Will took a shaky breath but said nothing. 

"Shall I do it again now? Will you be able to resist the urge to run from me?"

"Not from you. From the situation."

"A situation of my making, under my control." 

"You don’t have to tie me up." 

Hannibal trailed the tip of the scalpel down his spine and watched his muscles tense. "Are you certain? I’d hate to leave it half done. I’d have to go after you." 

Will turned to look back at him. Candlelight reflected in the black of his pupils. The thin ring of blue around them shone like a lunar eclipse. "Would you really?" he asked softly. "Would you hunt me down?" 

"I’d have to. How could I let you run off bleeding into the dark?" 

"When you could catch me and make me bleed some more?"

"And see to your wounds, of course." 

"Of course." 

A brief pause, and then Will twisted his body hard, and Hannibal’s world spun as he was dumped off the bed and onto the floor. Will paused for a second in the doorway and then he was gone, running, bare feet hitting the floor almost soundlessly. 

Hannibal started after him without thought, blind on his trail. He made it downstairs in time to see Will vault over the balustrade on the edge of the patio and race down the hill into the field below, vanishing from light into dark. Hannibal went after him. Of course. There was never any other choice with Will. 

He rushed down the gentle slope, eyes on Will’s naked body, the color of reflected moonlight now that he moved among the darker trees. He’d grown stronger over the summer, and Hannibal had let his own body rest while he watched Will thrive. Will was faster and younger and fitter—but not terribly used to running from his fears. 

Will stood on a rise, hesitating, looking back. Hannibal rose from the shadows, took him around the waist, and bore him down to the ground. They rolled over and over in the cool grass and ended with Hannibal on top, his arm across Will’s throat. 

Will was grinning up at him like a mad thing, all fear gone. Hannibal smoothed his hair back from his face, and Will snapped at his fingers. 

"I’ll have to clean your back again," Hannibal said. 

"If you can get me back to the house."

"Do you mean to fight me?" 

"Don’t you want me to?" 

Hannibal could see himself bearing down on Will’s throat, cutting off air and blood. He would watch the light of consciousness fade from Will’s eyes. Having seen both many times, he knew it wasn’t much different from watching life leave a body. 

The game palled abruptly. He lurched to his feet. "I’m going back to the house. If you care to join me, we can start over." 

After a second, he heard Will rise and follow him. 

They showered together in silence. 

"Bad idea?" Will said afterward, peering at Hannibal from under a towel as he scrubbed at his hair. 

"No. I can see it’s relaxed you. Exertion rids the body of unwanted adrenaline more quickly." 

"What about you?" 

"I could have choked you unconscious and carried you back to the house. Bound you. Done whatever I liked." 

"I was prepared for that." 

"I wasn’t," Hannibal said sharply. "You walk too close to the edge, and I’m the one who will bear the consequences if we slip." 

Will came to lean against his back, cheek on his shoulder. "You’re right. I’m sorry. I needed to do something. Maybe that wasn’t the best choice." 

"It was—remarkable."

Will kissed his neck. "I’ll wait in the bedroom."

Hannibal found him stretched out again, just as before. Both of them were naked this time. Hannibal wiped down his skin with alcohol. Will’s body was loose and easy this time. Hannibal found that echoed in himself. He had no thought of making things better or worse, only of doing what needed to be done. 

The first cut sent him back to medical school, to the operating room, to a thousand patients, draped and anonymous. It was only when he traced the scalpel along the sharp angle of the sextant that he returned thoroughly to the present, to Will, and to Will’s acceptance. 

Will lay with his head pillowed on his arms. He craned his head now and then to look back at Hannibal, but mostly he lay still. Cut after cut, the smallest flinches, closed eyes, fingers digging hard into his own bicep. 

"I will always chase after you," Hannibal said. 

Will smiled at him. "I know."

Hannibal cleaned away the blood when he was done. He dressed the wound and took the towels away to be washed. Will curled up on his side and stayed there until Hannibal got back and sat beside him. He took the ibuprofen Hannibal offered him without even a glance to see what the pills were. Afterward, he laid his head in Hannibal’s lap. 

"It hurts," he said. 

"Yes, I know. Shall I bring you something to eat?"

"Not yet. Stay here." 

Hannibal stayed and stroked his drying hair and the back of his neck. Will closed his eyes. 

"It wasn’t such a bad idea," Hannibal said. 

"No?" 

"I don’t want to hurt you."

"I know, you said—"

"No. I don’t mean only that I would regret it if I did. I mean I’ve lost much of my desire to see you in pain." 

He heard Will’s throat work, and Will looked up at him with wide, uncertain eyes. "Please don’t say that if it's not true." 

Hannibal bent and kissed his forehead. "I’m not lying. You’re right be suspicious of course. There is no deeper wound than betrayal." 

Will curled around him and pressed his face into his stomach. He said nothing. Gooseflesh rose along his arms. Hannibal pulled the blanket over him and arranged it so that the weight wouldn’t fall on his back. 

"You put a great deal of effort into trusting me," Hannibal said. 

"Yeah." 

"It’s a strain on you."

"Sometimes." 

"Let it go for a little while. Can you?" 

"You don’t want me to trust you?" 

"I want to care for you. I suppose I want you to take me for granted. To forget the effort we both put into maintaining our peace. Just for a few hours." 

Will looked up at him with shadowed eyes and a line between his brows. Hannibal touched it with his thumb and smoothed it away. 

"I— I can try," Will said, quiet and hesitant. "I wouldn’t mind— I kind of don’t feel so good right now." 

"I’m not surprised. The fear and anticipation, the run, the struggle, the physical wound will all take their toll. Wait for me. I'll be back in a moment." 

Will’s gaze followed him as he left the room. Hannibal thought of caring for him, of tea and toast, of wrapping him in his own robe. Of Will coming back to himself from this state of gray and shaky near-shock and regaining the almost fiercely cheerful state he’d lived in this summer. It struck him hard, a blow to the heart: he would prefer this to seeing him suffer, prefer it to the curious cruelty of earlier in the evening. Somehow that had ceased to compare to the pleasure of bringing Will Graham toast in bed. 

His actions in the kitchen were rote. Strong Russian tea with sugar and milk, rye toast with butter and cheddar cheese. He caught himself cutting melon balls into flowers and put them firmly on the plate. 

A few hours, he’d said. A few hours during which Will wouldn’t have to try so hard to trust him. During which Hannibal felt that he could trust himself. 

He carried the tray upstairs, set it on the bed, and got out pajamas for Will. 

"I don’t want a shirt," Will said. 

"You’re chilled." 

"Still don’t want it."

All right. Pajama bottoms and a blanket then, and the covers pulled over their legs. Will leaned sideways against Hannibal’s chest while he ate. 

"Hurts worse than last time." 

"I cut deeper. And excised a few sections of skin. I only cut in lines before." 

"Is this one going to disappear?"

"I don’t think so. I know more about it now. A professional in Paris recommends rubbing toasted sesame oil into it once it’s started to heal. It moisturizes and promotes scarring." 

"You sound skeptical." 

"There have been no properly controlled studies that I’m aware of. All of the evidence is anecdotal." 

He could feel Will’s smile against his skin. "Guess I’m your guinea pig then."

"As I am yours."

"That’s not fair." 

"Perhaps not, but it is true. Is that why you were so frightened? Not of the blade, but of the other parts of you I might choose to cut open in the spirit of experimentation?" 

Will sighed, a brief warmth against Hannibal’s shoulder. "Maybe," he said. "It did hurt. But other things hurt more." 

"You said you were prepared."

"I’m prepared for anything, with you." 

"But not right now." 

"Not right now," Will agreed, and curled himself closer. 

He fell asleep between one bite of toast and the next. Hannibal held him carefully, afraid to move even the tray lest he wake. The lamp was too far away to reach, and so he let it burn all night long as the candles guttered out one by one.


End file.
